


Can't Feel the Ground

by sister_wolf



Category: Batman (Comics), DCU (Comics)
Genre: Gen, Stephanie Brown is Robin, Vignette
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-11-01
Updated: 2005-11-01
Packaged: 2017-10-12 05:39:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 995
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/121401
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sister_wolf/pseuds/sister_wolf
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Being Robin is... it's <em>everything</em>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Can't Feel the Ground

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [](http://rubynye.livejournal.com/profile)[**rubynye**](http://rubynye.livejournal.com/), who requested "Any female Robin, exultant, proud."

Hand, foot, hand, foot. Grip, reach, shift, release.

She's been climbing for so long that she's lost track of time. She can tell by the lightening of the sky and the pre-dawn breeze that it's almost too late. Her arms and legs burn with exhaustion and her left foot is threatening to cramp. But there's no way that she's going to admit to failure.

She hears gulls screeching above her as the world starts to wake up. She really, really hopes she doesn't end up with bird shit on the Robin suit. It's not like Alfred will say anything, and it's certainly not like he hasn't cleaned worse off of it, but... it's the _Robin_ suit. She still doesn't feel like it's really hers. Still expects to see Tim walk through the entrance to the Cave one day, ready to take his cape back.

And the worst part of it is? She'd be _happy_ for him. Even though she never wants to be anything but Robin ever again. Being Robin is... it's _everything_.

Grip, reach, shift, release. Her left foot cramps and she breathes through the pain, then keeps going. She's tougher now than she ever was as Spoiler. Batman doesn't let her get away with slacking off on _anything_. She's pretty sure by now that he doesn't hate her. He may even like her, just a little bit. The first few weeks, though, when she was so exhausted that all she wanted after a night of training was to crawl off into a corner and die-- she'd been convinced that he was _trying_ to make her wash out, prove that she couldn't cut it. And that just put her back up, made her stubbornly determined to prove that she could _do_ it.

She can hear her dad's voice at the back of her head, gone rambling and effusive with drink, which was the stage just before angry and unreasonable. (She could almost like her dad at that point, talkative and charming, giving her surprise hugs and her mom surprise kisses in the kitchen. She'd known since she was little that this stage never lasted, though, and soon enough he'd be punching the wall and making her mother cry again.) Anyway.

He had this thing that he'd always say (cheeks gone red with drink, leaning back in his chair and gesturing while he talks loudly, like he's somebody important or something). "Stubborn and proud, Stephie, that's what the Browns have always been. You tell a Brown that he can't do something, and he'll walk in front of a bus just to prove you wrong. Too damn stubborn and proud to see that honest work gets you _nothing_ but screwed while the bosses are getting fat and rich by the sweat of your brow--" and he'd be off again, explaining why a life of crime was the only way for the common man to get one over on the rich bastards who run the world.

"Yeah, Dad, stick it to the Man. You're a regular fucking Robin Hood," Steph mutters to herself. There's a thin trickle of sweat itching its way down the side of her face, but she's a little too aware of exactly how far up off the ground she is to pause and wipe it off.

Hand, foot, hand, foot. She wonders how far she has left to go. Wonders if she can do it at all. Of course her dad would say that she couldn't, but she doesn't care what he says anymore. Once, when she was still young enough not to understand what a bastard he is, she showed him a note one of her teachers had sent home, saying how good she was at math and science, and that maybe she should get placed in the advanced classes. He'd laughed right in her face and told her she'd never be anything but a worthless bitch like her mother. When she thinks about it now, it makes her want to smash him in the face with a bo staff and then maybe tie him up and use him for batarang practice for a while, until he's bleeding like a stuck pig and _begging_ her not to kill him.

Steph pauses long enough to take a few deep breaths and push the fury down again, deep inside her where it always simmers. Batman tells her that she has too much of a temper, that she needs to not let it get away from her, not let it control her. That she's dangerous to herself and others if she lets her anger rule her. She sees his eyes flicker briefly, glancing at the Case like he's not even aware that he's doing it. He never says Jason's name.

He never has to.

Grip, reach, shift-- and she feels the edge of the metal platform on top of the bridge tower. She's made it to the top before sunrise. She didn't fail.

And it matters, even though no one else will ever know about this test that she laid for herself: to climb the highest bridge tower on the high bridge across the river, before dawn, without using any Bat ropes, no gadgets or tricks. Just her against gravity.

And she won. Steph clambers up onto the platform, settling down on the edge of it, her feet swinging over nothingness. She can see the whole city from here, waking up from the hopeless, endless dark of a Gotham night. They're her nights now-- their nights.

Her and Batman. Batman and Robin.

"And I'm Robin! You hear that, Gotham?" she yells, feeling her words get snatched away by the wind, carried along and scattered over the harbor. "I'm Robin!"

The gulls screech, unimpressed. Steph laughs, lying back on the cold metal of the platform and staring up at the sky. There's only a few clouds up there, turning faintly pink in the reflected light of sunrise.

Looks like it's gonna be a pretty good day.


End file.
